Oprah Gets Apology After Swiss Store Fails To Realize She’s Rich

While media mogul Oprah Winfrey has been promoting her new film, “Lee Daniels’ The Butler,” she revealed she was a recent victim of profiling while shopping in a store in Zurich. The Swiss tourism office and shop owner have now apologized for the incident.

“I was in Zurich the other day at a store, whose name I will not mention,” Winfrey said on “Entertainment Tonight,” “and I didn’t have my eyelashes on, but I was in full Oprah Winfrey gear…but obviously, ‘The Oprah Winfrey Show’ is not shown in Zurich. So this doesn’t happen to me unless somebody obviously doesn’t know that it’s me.”

Winfrey went on to explain that she was in Zurich for Tina Turner’s wedding, and decided to leave the hotel by herself to do some shopping. Inside one shop, she asked a sales assistant if she could see a black handbag. “She says to me, ‘No. It’s too expensive.’” Winfrey said. When Winfrey repeated her request, the assistant said she couldn’t afford it, and tried to show her different handbags.

“I said, ‘I really did want to see that one,’ and she refused to get it,” Winfrey said. She said she repeatedly asked to see the handbag, and finally gave up and left, not wanting to make a scene. “I could have had the big blow-up thing and thrown down the black card and all that stuff, but why do that?” Winfrey said, never naming the store.

On Friday, Daniela Baer, a spokeswoman for the Swiss tourism office told the Associated Press, ”We are very sorry for what happened to her, of course, because we think all of our guests and clients should be treated respectfully, in a professional way.”

The shop’s owner, Trudie Goetz, called the incident a “misunderstanding” in speaking with the BBC. She also told the Blick newspaper that the handbag in question cost $38,000, the AP said. ”I have to admit that the employee is Italian. Of course, she speaks English, but not as well as her mother tongue,” Goetz was quoted as saying. “It was a real misunderstanding.”

This is the second encounter Winfrey has experienced in a European retail shop. In 2005, a Hermes store in Paris refused to allow Winfrey to enter, saying it was closed for a private event. Winfrey said she was treated rudely. An executive for the company later apologized to her.

[Note: This article has been updated and the headline has been changed.]